For many years automotive manufacturers have been concerned with designing seats for vehicles that provide added comfort to seated occupants. This has led to various typed of ventilated seats exist, including heated, air conditioned, and ventilated seats. In many cases, integrating the necessary components into a vehicle seat in a way that is easy to manufacture and assemble is not easy.
For example, when it is desired to provide a vehicle seat that pushes or pulls air through an air permeable seat cover, an air distribution system is necessary to provide airflow between the upwardly-facing A-side of the seat cushion, which is covered by the seat cover, and a space below the opposite, downwardly-facing B-side of the seat cushion.
This air distribution system additionally needs to be coupled to an inlet/outlet of a blower or other mechanism to provide positive or negative air pressure through the air distribution system. Typically, the inlet/outlet of such a blower or other mechanism to which the air distribution system needs to be coupled is fixedly or immovably coupled to a portion of a supporting base or frame of the seat. Visual and physical access to the location of the inlet/outlet the blower or other mechanism is, in some cases, at least partially blocked as the foam seat cushion with the air distribution system is coupled to the frame. Thus, it is desirable to provide a blind coupling mechanism and process to couple the inlet/outlet of an air distribution system fixed to the B-side of the seat cushion to the inlet/outlet of the blower or other mechanism fixed to the seat frame or base.